MC CENTER FOR INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION

Sunday, September 24, 2017

Ni una asesinada mas: Not another woman killed

Grace CostaUPAEP, MexicoSeven women are killed every day in Mexico, according to the ONU. On September 8th, Mara Castillo, a student of my university, was on of those women. She had ordered a taxi at 5 am from a club in Cholula using the app Cabify. That was the last time she was seen alive. Her body was later found and they confirmed that she was raped and killed.

On the 18th, I marched with thousands of students and Poblanos (members of the city of Puebla) from UPAEP to the center of Puebla. We wore white and carried posters that condemned the feminine of 19-year-old Mara and thousands like her that are killed every year in Mexico. According to the Observatorio Ciudadano Nacional del Feminicidio (OCNF), there have been more than 2,500 femicides in Mexico since 2013.

In January of this year, I marched with millions of women around the world for women's rights and equality. In Puebla, I marched for the right of women to live and breathe alongside men who would rather murder and rape them because of their masculine sense of superiority. Of course it felt empowering to chant with the crowds "Justicia para Mara!" and "Ni una más, ni una más, ni una asesinada más", but that feeling evaporated when I remembered going out with friends to a bar only days before. Walking through the streets on our way to a bar, we were approached by men, catcalled, followed briefly, and unable to diffuse the situation without the help of the guys in our group. If I choose to wear shorts or a dress, men on the streets give me ravenous looks, catcall me, or whistle. Days after the protest, I wore a dress to school and I narrowly escaped being full-on groped by some nasty piece of scum on the bus. A better world is possible. I haven't given up yet.